• Journal of rehabilitation welfare engineering & assistive technology
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• v.4 no.1
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• pp.63-70
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• 2010

Research and development of Assistive Technology (AT) for blind people is primarily focused on assisting mobility and improving access to information. Some particularly useful devices for aiding access to information and communication are DAISY players used with talking books, screen readers for reading screens, video magnifiers to aid low vision, Braille displays, and Braille PDAs. These essential devices have been successfully commercialized and have assisted many visually impaired people. Assistive technology devices for visually impaired people are called sensory substitution devices, because these devices substitute tactile or auditory functions for visual functions. The tactile interfaces of sensory substitution devices such as Braille displays and Braille PDAs have a bimorph type of piezoelectric actuator that forms a Braille (pin) of the Braille cells by moving up and down. KGS Corporation of Japan has more than 80% share of the worldwide market for these Braille cell actuators. Commercializing it for the first time in the world. This paper reviews the various endeavors in Japan in the research and development of tactile displays, such as Braille displays and Braille PDAs. Furthermore, it discusses sensory substitution devices that use tactile displays, focusing especially on the rotating Braille display we have developed.

• Journal of Institute of Control, Robotics and Systems
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• v.11 no.11
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• pp.943-949
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• 2005

For the psychophysical experiment of tactile perception of shapes, experimental system consists of vibrator, tactile stimulation array, measurement and control system is designed and prepared. The psychophysical experiment for the tactile perception of shape is carried out by the estimation of the subject group. Through the experiment the threshold of tactile perception to multi-stimuli with some line shape is obtained. Also the appropriate tactile stimulus intensity and frequency of the tactile stimulation array to recognize arbitrary shapes effectively are derived and discussed.

• 제어로봇시스템학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2004.08a
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• pp.596-601
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• 2004

In this paper, we describe a study on the influence of the frequency variation of normal vibration using an integrated tactile display. It is necessary to consider this study because we want to find a method of displaying finer texture and know that the perception of fine textures is heavily influenced by temporal variation. Our tactile display system used in this experiment can simulate the micro shapes and roughness of surface textures by individual drives of a 6x8 pin array. Two experiments are performed. The first is a psychophysical experiment on the definition and range decision of roughness, and through the experiment, we clear up the meaning of roughness. The second is the main experiment about the frequency variation of normal vibration. We find the correlation between the vibration frequency and the texture and the condition for better display and perception of fine surfaces. The experimental results yielded two pieces of information. One is that lateral movement affects texture discrimination, and another is that normal vibration can make the perceived texture feel finer than real texture. That is, the vibrating stimulus is more effective for displaying a fine surface than static pressure, and it makes possible to display finer texture, exceeding the physical limit of the device.

• Journal of Korea Multimedia Society
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• v.12 no.5
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• pp.708-716
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• 2009

Applications which are implemented on Table Top Display are controlled by hands, so that they support an intuitive interface to users. Users feel the real sense when they interact on the virtual scene in Table Top Display. However, most of conventional augmented reality applications on Table Top Display satisfy only visual sense. In this paper, we propose an interface that supports multi-modal sense in that tactile sense is utilized for augment reality by vibrating a physical control unit when it collides to virtual objects. Users can feel the collision in addition to visual scene. The proposed system facilitates tactile augmented reality through an air hockey game. A physical control unit vibrates when it receives virtual collision data over wireless communication. Since the use of tabletop display environment is extended with a tactile sense based physical unit other than hand, it provides a more intuitive interface.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Precision Engineering Conference
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• 2003.10a
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• pp.113-113
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• 2003

• Journal of Appropriate Technology
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• v.6 no.2
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• pp.146-150
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• 2020

Assistive technologies for people with disabilities are often marginalized in the Fourth Industrial Revolution. In this paper, we intend to present the possibility of acquiring tactile information through the tactile display adapting an electromagnetic actuator. The multi-layered display designed for tactile communication has innovatively narrowed the size and spacing of cells in order to express pictures, maps, and graphics. This display has enabled the visually impaired to touch two-dimensional information combining with other assistive technologies so that. It would also provide a technical source of access to STEM education (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) so that students will perform better and be better prepared for advanced education. Moreover, it can be applied to public infrastructure and transportation in smart-city projects on the globe. Hence, this paper introduces the principle of Electromagnetic-actuator and how it can be utilized in many diverse areas.

• 제어로봇시스템학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2004.08a
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• pp.171-175
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• 2004

A tactile stimulator array using stacked PZT is fabricated and evaluated in this paper. The purpose of this research is the development of a tactile stimulator to represent the obstacle information for the visually disabled. As a first step of this research, we investigate the physiological characteristics of tactile stimuli and design a tactile stimulator based on the investigated results. Also we evaluated a fabricated tactile stimulator. The prototype of tactile stimulator which has 2x2 tactor elements with 3mm spacing is fabricated using stacked PZT actuator. In order to evaluate the characteristics of this tactile stimulator, physiological experiments are carried out. In the experiment, the threshold of tactile stimulus intensity within a frequency range of 5-500Hz and at various stimulus amplitudes are investigated. According to the obtained experimental result, the input signal of tactile stimulator for the transfer of obstacle information is determined. Also physiological experiments of multi-stimuli recognition such as shift and rotation are carried out.

• Journal of the HCI Society of Korea
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• v.1 no.2
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• pp.19-26
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• 2006

This paper presents a novel pneumatic tactile display that can deliver some useful information. The air-jet display forms 5 by 5 arrays and features air nozzles with an external diameter of 2.4mm and internal diameter of 1.5 mm. In comparison with other tactile displays such as vibrotactile, there is little concrete psychophysical data relating to pneumatic displays, a fact which hinders their adoption. This paper addresses this challenge, and presents brief psychophysical studies examining localization rate, the two point threshold, stimulus intensity and the temporal threshold of cues produced by pneumatic air jets. Two groups of subjects were used in these studies, subsequently termed groups A and B. Both were comprised of eight participants. In the case of localization study we obtained 58.13% and 85.9% of localization rates each for dense display and sparse display. Two-points threshold test showed the length of gap between two air-jet stimuli which subjects can detect. However, it was formidable to find out precise temporal resolution of PTI owing to the limitation of capability of the pneumatic valves. Lastly, the results of stimulus intensity study suggest that by varying the size of a pneumatically created tactile stimulus, we can effectively vary its perceived magnitude.

• ETRI Journal
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• v.29 no.3
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• pp.305-310
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• 2007

If a virtual object in a virtual environment represented by a stereo vision system could be touched by a user with some tactile feeling on his/her fingertip, the sense of reality would be heightened. To create a visual impression as if the user were directly pointing to a desired point on a virtual object with his/her own finger, we need to align virtual space coordinates and physical space coordinates. Also, if there is no tactile feeling when the user touches a virtual object, the virtual object would seem to be a ghost. Therefore, a haptic interface device is required to give some tactile sensation to the user. We have constructed such a human-computer interaction system in the form of a simple virtual reality game using a stereo vision system, a vibro-tactile device module, and two position/orientation sensors.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Precision Engineering Conference
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• 2011.06a
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• pp.1081-1082
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• 2011